Faith and football for Elon QB

Wednesday

ELON — After Daniel Thompson entered last week’s game in relief duty at quarterback for Elon, he quickly was met with a welcome-back-to-football moment at full volume.

Only it wasn’t so inviting.

His fourth pass against Maine, on a field that hours earlier had been covered by snow, went to tight end Matt Foster for 14 yards, setting up the Phoenix with first-and-goal during a drive that eventually produced Elon’s first touchdown. The throw required Thompson to absorb a punishing blow from Maine linebacker Jaron Grayer.

“I got absolutely drilled,” Thompson said. “I got up and it hurt, it wasn’t fun, but I was just so excited to get hit again. It sounds crazy, but it was a completed ball and those are things as a quarterback, as a player, you love.”

Two years later, football felt better than ever.

Now, through a long absence that had him doubting whether he’d play quarterback in another college game, the senior Thompson is preparing for his first starting assignment since November 2016, as the Phoenix (6-4) approaches its first-round date with Wofford (8-3) in the Football Championship Subdivision playoffs.

It’s a development that even the most-devoted followers of the Elon program likely wouldn’t have envisioned across the course of these last two seasons, with Thompson relegated to a third-string role behind Davis Cheek and Jalen Greene, and the setting for the playoff matchup serves to further ripen the situation.

Gibbs Stadium at Wofford sits about 8 miles from Thompson’s hometown of Boiling Springs, S.C.

“It’s quite a story,” Elon coach Curt Cignetti said.

“Ten minutes with traffic,” Thompson said. “It’s two turns.”

He will arrive Saturday having put in the same practice work, film study and mental planning per usual — “I’ve been preparing to start every week for the past two years,” Thompson said — but he will be armed with broader perspective, though, in comparison to the 2015 and 2016 seasons, when he started 16 games under former Elon coach Rich Skrosky.

Thompson, who turned 23 on Tuesday and is engaged to an Elon volleyball player, said with the benefit of time and maturity, he has learned to let go of the perfectionist approach he applied to quarterbacking as a younger player.

“My mindset, it’s very different,” he said. “I feel like my freshman and sophomore year I was focused so much on the result and success and all that stuff, I tried very hard to play well. And now that I’m older, I realize I don’t have to try ridiculously hard. You’ve just got to see what you see and get the ball to your guy.”

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Cignetti said Thompson “gave us something last week” after replacing Greene in the second quarter of Elon’s eventual 27-26 loss to Maine, which claimed the Colonial Athletic Association title with the narrow victory.

That remark was made in reference to Thompson’s production — 250 passing yards and one touchdown against a defense ranked third nationally in the FCS — and the distinct air of leadership that offensive lineman Alex Higgins and receiver Cole Taylor said Thompson injected out of the bullpen for the Phoenix.

“I’ve never doubted him,” Higgins said. “Guys kind of got behind him and we started rolling.”

Thompson started the final 10 games of the 2016 season as Elon went 2-9. He had been reduced to holding duties on point-after kicks and field goals while never attempting a pass during the last two seasons, looking on as Cheek blossomed into the 2017 Offensive Rookie of the Year in the CAA, steered Elon to the FCS playoffs last season and powered the Phoenix to a No. 5 national ranking this season, before suffering a torn knee ligament in October.

In the spring of 2017, with Cignetti having taken over, the Elon coaching staff made the wipe-the-slate-clean decision to go with Cheek and Greene, then a pair of true freshmen, at quarterback. Connor Christiansen changed sides of the ball from quarterback to defensive back, and Thompson was lowered on the depth chart to third string.

“I was down,” Thompson said. “I was like, ‘I’m never going to get to play anymore,’ and my dad said you have one of two options: You can pout and everybody would kind of understand it, or you can be the person we raised you to be and that you are. You can rise above it. You can support it and support your team, and be there. Still compete and still want to play, but be there. Be there for everyone.”

Heeding heartfelt messages such as those from his father and forever guided by his devout religious faith, Thompson became what many around the Elon team view as something of a player-coach, pitching in to help mentor and nurture the progress of Cheek, the standout, and Greene, the backup.

“He’s been great and really has helped those guys out,” Cignetti said.

“The best way to put it about Daniel is he’s a great teammate,” Higgins said. “He wants other guys to succeed around him, even when it’s not him in there playing quarterback. He wants Davis and Jalen to be as good as they possibly can be, and by doing that you become better yourself, especially with the mental part of things.”

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Cole Coleman, Elon’s promising freshman defensive back, was discussing the learning curve he has traveled during a conversation last week, when he used Thompson’s status as the Phoenix’s wise old hand for a playful means of illustration.

“I came in at 17 years old and I’m taking college classes,” Coleman said. “Some of my teammates are 23. Daniel’s getting married. Like, ‘Man I’ve never even had a girlfriend and you’re getting married? What’s going on here?’ ”

Thompson and fiancée Maddie Jaudon, a senior defensive specialist on the Elon volleyball team, are to be married July 6 of next year.

He proposed in February while they took part in a Night to Shine event, a prom-night experience for people with special needs that’s sponsored by the Tim Tebow Foundation. Thompson said it was a scene befitting their relationship.

“I think something like that really embodies who we try to be as a couple,” he said. “People who serve and people who love, and put others before ourselves.”

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FCS playoffs — first round

Who: Elon (6-4) at Wofford (8-3)

When: 2 p.m. Saturday

Where: Gibbs Stadium, Spartanburg, S.C.

Series: Wofford leads 26-11

Extra point: The winner advances to meet No. 4 national seed Kennesaw State (10-1) on Dec. 1 in the second round

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